The Year We Sailed the Sun Read online

  Tom and Annie Edmonston Hunter (Nana and Pops)

  Aunt Mary Louise Terry

  Aunt Marjorie Peterson Minton

  Uncle Keith Hunter

  Uncle Harbert Hunter

  Aunt Frances Heyck

  The world’s best brothers, sisters, and All-Texas Pep Squad: David and Terri Nelson, Frances and Tim Arnoult, Hunter and Betsy Nelson, Mary Pat and Marty Gross, Carroll and Jeff Patrizi, Annie and Wayne Kansas, Jane and Joe Bob Kinsel, James and Cindy Nelson, John Henry Nelson, William Joseph Nelson

  David and Theresa Patricia Cullen Nelson (our Gran, his darling girl)

  Sister Mary Davidica Nelson, O.P. (Aunt Mary)

  Father James A. Nelson (Uncle Jim)

  Aunt Jane Nelson White

  Aunt Patricia Phelan Milam

  Father John Regis Stacer, S.J. (Cousin Johnny)

  Elizabeth Cullen Nelson, fearless left-hand turner

  Cousin Janice White Ondrusek, champion family chronicler

  My extraordinary teachers: Sister Emily Bordages, Sister Francis Clare (Clare Mead Rosen), and Sister JoAnn Neihaus, O.P.

  Mitali Perkins

  Sid Fleischman

  Christoper Paul Curtis

  Phyllis Reynolds Naylor, the great-hearted, and everyone at PEN/America, whose Working Writer Fellowship came as such a tremendous encouragement when it was most needed

  Jillian Hartke, Todd Christine, Seth Smith, Jason Stratman, and all the wonderfully helpful people at the State Historical Society of Missouri

  Bonnie J. Morgan at the Montana Historical Society, and Carole Richards at the Powder River County Courthouse, Broadus, Montana, who helped us locate Miss Cora Downey’s homestead

  Sean McGlade, who so kindly solved the mystery of the Irish-Gaelic lyrics

  Legions of librarians—my heroes—in particular those at the Beverly Hills Public Library and the Los Angeles Public Library (downtown and at the Sherman Oaks, Studio City, and Fairfax branches)

  Douglas E. Abrams, for his book A Very Special Place in Life: The History of Juvenile Justice in Missouri, The Missouri Juvenile Justice Association, OJJDP, 2003

  James Neal Primm, for Lion of the Valley: St. Louis, Missouri, 1765–1980, 3rd edition, St. Louis, Missouri Historical Society Press, distributed by the University of Missouri Press, 1998

  Robert Kinsey Howard, for Montana: High, Wide and Handsome, Yale University, 1944

  Robert Hunt, for his gorgeous jacket painting

  Sonia Chaghatzbanian, for her graceful book design

  Ariel Colletti, Jessica Sit, Kaitlin Severini, Clare McGlade, and the whole terrific team at Atheneum and Simon & Schuster

  And thanks most of all, forever and always:

  To my favorite dancers and storytellers—the finest and funniest, bravest and best—my parents, Carroll and David Nelson of Beaumont, Texas

  To Kevin, my rock, and our children and grandchildren: Michael Christopher, Brian David, Errol Andrew (who helped me with Julia’s music) and Erin Elizabeth Cooney; Mick, Stella Carroll, Everett Walter, and Cullen Michael

  And to Richard Jackson, that dear, stubborn man, my incomparable editor and friend, who refused to stop believing that Julia would make it to Montana—once again—against all odds.

  Theresa Nelson has written seven novels for young readers—among them The 25¢ Miracle, And One for All, Ruby Electric, and the Boston Globe–Horn Book Honor Book Earthshine.

  This latest book was inspired by the real childhood of her husband’s mother. For more true-to-history details, such as the October 7, 1911, St. Louis Browns versus Detroit Tigers baseball game, or the memorable weather of the 1912 winter, see the Author’s Note inside.

  The mother of three adult sons and grandmother of four—three boys and a blue-eyed girl—Theresa Nelson lives with her husband, actor Kevin Cooney, in Houston, Texas. Visit her at TheresaNelson.net.

  A Richard Jackson Book

  Atheneum Books for Young Readers

  Simon & Schuster • New York

  Meet the author, watch videos, and get extras at

  KIDS.SimonandSchuster.com

  authors.simonandschuster.com/Theresa-Nelson

  ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

  The 25¢ Miracle

  Devil Storm

  And One for All

  The Beggars’ Ride

  Earthshine

  The Empress of Elsewhere

  Ruby Electric

  WE HOPE YOU LOVED READING THIS EBOOK!

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  ATHENEUM BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2015 by Theresa Nelson

  Jacket design by Sonia Chaghatzbanian

  Jacket illustration copyright © 2015 by Robert Hunt

  The hymn “In the Bleak Midwinter” (pp. 270–272) is taken from the poem (of the same name) by Christina Rossetti.

  Title page and Part I photos are used with permission of the

  Missouri History Museum, St. Louis.

  Part II photo is a vintage postcard, courtesy of the Missouri State Archives.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  ATHENEUM BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS is a registered trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Book design by Sonia Chaghatzbanian

  The text for this book is set in Fournier MT Std.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Nelson, Theresa, 1948-

  The year we sailed the sun / Theresa Nelson.

  pages cm

  Summary: In St. Louis, Missouri, in 1911, orphaned eleven-year-old Julia Delaney rails against countless disappointments and the nun’s strict rules at the House of Mercy, especially after her sister Mary turns fourteen and must leave, but she, her family, and best friend get tangled up with a gangster and a decade-old mystery.

  ISBN 978-0-689-85827-7 (hardcover) — ISBN 978-1-4814-0649-9 (eBook)

  [1. Orphanages—Fiction. 2. Orphans—Fiction. 3. Nuns—Fiction. 4. Behavior—Fiction. 5. Brothers and sisters—Fiction. 6. Gangsters—Fiction. 7. St. Louis (Mo.)—History—20th century—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.N4377Ye 2015

  [Fic]—dc23 2014034956